


Unfixable

by ALostHeart



Category: The Originals (TV), The Vampire Diaries (TV)
Genre: Angst, Hallucinations, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, hunter's curse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-06
Updated: 2018-07-06
Packaged: 2019-06-06 07:33:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,304
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15189908
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ALostHeart/pseuds/ALostHeart
Summary: There is little that Elijah can do to alleviate his brother's suffering brought on by the Hunter's Curse.





	Unfixable

**Author's Note:**

> For anyone who is not familiar with TVD or just doesn't remember: The Hunter's Curse is constant hallucinations encouraging a vampire to end their life. It's caused when a vampire kills a hunter (a special, powerful, magical kind). In the fourth season of TVD, Klaus tells Elena that he suffered from this curse for fifty two years after killing a hunter (without knowing about the curse) during the first couple of centuries of their transitioning to vampires. This fic takes place during this time period when he was suffering from said curse.

Elijah wanders through darkened hallways. Flickers of flames print his shadow across yellowing walls. He feels their heat tickling his face, as if attempting to comfort him, attempting to wrap him in warmth. But there is no soothing the weight in his chest. Nothing can alleviate the brick holding him down, strapping his spirits to the ground. His pace is slow, steps loud in the silence of the night.

“How is he?” he hears himself saying, the sound coming from somewhere within, beyond his throat. It’s coming from his chest, scratching its way up his vocal cords to come out sad and helpless. Useless.

Rebekah looks up from her kneeling position against a metal door. Her eyes red-rimmed. Her face pale. She looks older than she actually is. She looks older than she’ll ever be. When she answers, her eyes evade Elijah’s,

“The only reprieve he got today was when I snapped his neck.”

Elijah swallows. Doesn’t say anything. How much longer will he have to suffer like this? It’s been too long and their hope is dwindling. Kol spat it in his face. Foolish Elijah, he said. Always trying to fix the unfixable, he said. Why must you always have something to fix? He said. He’s gone, Elijah, he said. He will never come back, he said. And a panic has begun to form in his chest. A dreadful fear sneaking across his limbs and causing a tremble in his lips, and a shakiness in his steps. And now, as he looks at Rebekah, he sees it in her eyes, the lost will. The fear that they’ll have to move on. The fear that they will not be able to.

He says none of it. Words are meaningless when they are needed most. Instead he strains his hearing to the quiet room beyond the metal door. Whimpers, soft weeping, pleas for mercy. Nothing out of the usual at this point. If it’s not shrieks of anguish, that is. And yet. The familiarity of the sound does not lessen its effect. The first time Elijah heard it he finally understood what a broken heart felt like. And every time it breaks again and again and again. With no hope of mending. Not anytime soon. Not ever perhaps. And he knows that going inside will not help. He knows that his presence will not soothe his brother’s pain. All he’ll get is fleeting seconds of recognition. Ones that’ll only tear him apart further. Ones that almost certainly do not help Niklaus in the slightest.

And yet.

He pushes the door opened.

Niklaus is curled onto himself in a corner. His knees are drawn up against his chest. He’s wrapped his arms around them, as if he’s trying to hold himself together. Back and forth, he rocks. Eyes wide, damp with tears, staring into an invisible point beyond Elijah, beyond the confines of the room. There are trails of tears on his cheeks. His lips move, muttering something that Elijah cares not to understand. It does not seem to matter.

“Niklaus.” He says softly, moving closer to him. He receives no response. “Brother.” He says again, now crouching in front of him. He places a gentle hand on his knee. “Niklaus look at me.”

The touch seems to snap Niklaus out of his reverie. He flinches first, body going rigid. Then blinks several times, now awakening. “’Lijah.” He breathes, his lips trembling, body relaxing again. “You came back.” He says, a disbelieving smile forming.

Before Elijah can comprehend what he’s said, Niklaus launches himself at him, wrapping his arms around him as if they have not seen each other in centuries. The embrace knocks the wind out of Elijah’s lungs, causing him to stumble back, almost falling before he rights himself. Niklaus buries his face in Elijah’s neck, breathing him in, unaware that he’s slowly crushing Elijah’s bones. Elijah feels his ribcage cracking under the force. And yet. He does nothing but draw Niklaus closer, ignoring the pain, squashing the wince that wants to escape. It’s rare these days for Niklaus to willingly embrace Elijah. Most of the time his reaction is murderous, knocking him out, attempting to impale him. And Elijah finds a sense of relief wash over him as he holds Niklaus. He’s missed him. So much more than he’s willing to admit.

“My brother,” Niklaus sobs, “you came back.”

Elijah squeezes Niklaus against him one last time before gently pulling back. He traces Niklaus’ face, pushing his hair off of his face. Niklaus’ palms are on his chest, his fingers digging into his tunic.

“I never left brother.” He says, tone firm.

Niklaus blinks, stutters out, “y-y-you didn’t?”

“No, Niklaus. I never left. I’ve always been here.”

“But Mikael said you left me. Mikael said you all left me.” Niklaus chokes out. And Elijah can no longer look into his eyes, not without spiraling into a pit of despair. One that he cannot succumb into, not when Niklaus needs steady feet. So he brings him close once again, holding him against his chest, running soothing fingers through his hair.

“He lied to you.” Elijah says. There is no use in explaining to Niklaus that he has not spoken to Mikael in over a century. Niklaus’ grasp on reality has long since slipped. And Elijah wonders, when…if he’s ever cured of his disease, how he’ll ever attach his feet to the ground beneath him again. “He lied to you. We did not leave you.” He takes a deep breath, swallows the forming lump in his throat. “I did not leave you.” He exhales. “I would never leave you.”

Niklaus’ grip tightens on Elijah. “Promise me that you won’t leave, ‘Lijah.” He says, voice shaking. “Please, promise me you will not leave.”

A tear slides down Elijah’s cheek. He squeezes Niklaus closer to him. “I promise you I will never leave.”

Niklaus stiffens in Elijah’s hold, pushes him away. His eyes blaze with anger as they meet Elijah’s. “You’re lying. You’re planning to leave right now. Even as I hold you, you dare to lie to me. Perhaps I should kill y–.”

In one swift movement, Elijah snaps Niklaus’ neck. He catches his body before it hits the floor, cradling Niklaus in his arms like he’s once done when they were children and he was nursing Niklaus’ fever. He looks as vulnerable and innocent now as he did back then. These are the only moments of comfort that he gets. And as Elijah holds Niklaus against him, with no breath escaping his lips and no heartbeat against his chest, a sob pierces itself through him.

“I’m sorry, my brother. I’m so sorry.”

And for the next twenty years, Elijah cannot stop his remorse from spilling from his lips and onto his hands to surround Niklaus’s every moment. Nor does it stop as one day Niklaus wakes up and the voices have ceased and he sees only what’s before him but continues to confuse it for a conjuring of his exhausted mind. And he continues to apologize for the next fifty years as Niklaus fights and fights and fights to pull himself together and strap himself back to the ground. And he never quite manages to squash the piling up guilt even as years turn to decades and decades into centuries and cruelty seems to take permanent residence in the corner of Klaus’s eyes and his lucidity becomes as insane as his dazed hallucinations and he begins to crave the warmth of his brother who once carved him a wooden sword just because he loved him. And he waits and waits for the return of those clear blue eyes every moment as if they are just around the corner even though he knows, he is quite certain, that they cannot return to those times anymore.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [I had a family, once.](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16925898) by [sicklyscribe](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sicklyscribe/pseuds/sicklyscribe)




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